The five myths of weight lifting or why some people can't do a PR

I originally submitted to this article to EliteFTS.com about two weeks ago unfortunately they never got back with me on whether or not they would publish this article so instead I am putting it up on this blog instead.

I have weight lifter’s ADD-- sad to say but it is true-- I am one of those people that spends a great deal of their time trolling the Internet for the newest, latest and most unconventional ways on how to get strong.
Of course with all my vast fitness knowledge, countless hours spent lifting iron and overall craziness I am relatively weak. I wish I could tell you that I looked like the incredible hulk, or weighed 145-pounds and could bench a half ton of weight.
The sad truth is I’m not a freak in any sense of the word, I’m fit, but not freaky.
However, with my constant self-experimentation I would say I have some good insight and advice in the world of strength training and fitness. I can honestly say that I am probably stronger then the average guy with a gym membership and have managed to accomplish a few personal fitness goals as well.
Some of those goals is a constant weight gain (from 145-185-pounds) since I started college in late-2006 and graduation in 2011. Took up steel bending for one year and managed to bend a few small nails before stopping and losing the skill all together and being able to successfully do a free standing hand stand pushup.
So here for your pleasure I present 5-weight lifting myths that I have discovered through my self-experimentation.

Myth 5: The biggest guy is the strongest guy or why bodybuilders are not the strongest

Look I have been there I have been that self-obsessed, image absorbed guy who wanted to be huge. I always told myself that wasn’t the case but truthfully I started out weight lifting for sport specific training and became more interested in the glamour of it all.
Bodybuilders are all about the pump and while there are some very strong bodybuilders who can bench press about 600-pounds there also guys who are about 90-pounds lighter who can do the exact same thing. 600-pound benchers in bodybuilding is not the norm it is the exception.
Of course strength is a hard thing to measure because there are many types of strength but in the pure sense of the traditional lifts: Dead lifting, benching and squat the biggest guys are not putting up the top numbers in these categories.
Remember, bodybuilding is about the pump not the poundage strength is just a by product that comes along with training hard.

Myth 4: You can’t get stronger at your current weight or why bulking up is only slightly crap

Look I can honestly say that I have tried bulking up and despite a constant positive looking muscular weight gain I have made relatively small gains in certain critical lifts.
I will first like to say that weight lifting starts first as a skill, second as overall personal psychology, third as good nutrition and lastly your genetic limitations at a given weight.
I have never been stronger then I have been right now and am currently 15-pounds lighter then my heaviest weight of 185-pounds. I was fit at 185 but I am superman at 170 in my most difficult lift--the bench.
Everyone is so obsessed with the bench despite it not being nearly as critically or developmentally as important as the dead lift and squat-- this of course is a topic for another article.
I have essentially become a better bencher out of the necessity to become a better lifter.
I taught myself how to bench as a technical skill that requires correct positioning of the shoulders, back and legs. You engage more muscles then just your chest in the bench and it is important to learn how to properly , lower the weight as well as pushing it up.
There are about a hundred itsy-bitsy things that can help to improve a bench press but the most key and critical thing I have learned is body positioning you need to know how to engage your legs, lats and triceps and protect your shoulders so you don’t hurt them.
A smart lifter is a healthy lifter and just about every lift has a few correct ways of doing it and about 100 wrong ways.
Another thing is finding psychological weakness-- a lot of people are going to sell themselves short on a lift just because they can’t believe they are trying to lift that much.
The truth is most people have it in them to accomplish great feats of strength but the psychology isn’t there. Each lifting routine should include some sort of meditation-- not the Buddhist kind but some sort of routine to put you in a winning state of mind.
Possibilities include: listening to certain types of music, visualization technique or like arm wrestler Travis Bagent screaming and self-hype.
Finally, if you are purely concerned about strength and have made all the adjustments and can’t seem to get stronger gain weight. Hypertrophy isn’t the be all or end all in strength gains but sometimes it is necessary.

Myth 3: Getting stronger and hypertrophy requires almost constant working out

Once again this another one of those myths that are not true-- these work out splits that they sell in bodybuilding magazines where a person trains five maybe six days a week is crap.
If you train that much you might get some good definition but you are also not going to make significant weight gains and will just make yourself sick from over training.
Do you think these bodybuilders are training six days a week for most of the year-- doubt it. I can’t actually say since I have never once been close to winning a Mr. Olympia but I can tell you that I made the biggest weight gains when I switched to a high intensity three-days a week workout.
I did everything I could do to reach that epic muscular failure that is so glamorized by meat heads in the work out magazines. Exercising like this allowed me to gain nearly 15lbs in one month.
Lets look at a not to scientific explanation: Muscle fibers break down, then they get plenty of rest to grow back bigger and stronger.
It doesn’t make sense that training to constant failure six out of seven days a week would make you get big and strong. When does your body have time to recuperate?
Hypertrophy is due to micro-tears in your muscle fibers if you are always tearing and splitting those fibers they aren’t going to have a chance to adapt.
In fact you will just make yourself sick from over training and then you won’t be able to work out-- so you are doing yourself a favor when you give yourself an extra day of rest.
The same goes with power lifting if you don’t hit that weight you were gunning for then you probably need to take a rest so that your body can heal back stronger.

MYTH 2: Flexibility makes you weaker or why I choose to give up my ability to tie my own shoes

There is this idea that stretching will make you weaker, while there may be some truth to this it is still only a half-truth.

The number one purpose of stretching is to prevent injury and to remove tightness from muscles.
Yet for some strange reason people view stretching as sissy and totally avoid the practice-- those people often times are the people who complain of bad backs from years of dead lifting heavy poundage.
To a degree if you stretch before a work out you are in a way overworking your muscles before lifting and could be making them weaker. Of course that is only a temporary result of stretching.
Stretching is something that should be done usually in between sets or after a workout.
Stretching is going to help remove blood from your muscles and help to relieve some of that next day soreness. There of course are some other benefits of stretching that weight lifters may not be aware off.
Stretching can be effectively used to increase muscle fullness in hypertrophy--if you don’t believe me then its time to seriously look into Dogg Crap Training.
In DC training weighted stretches are used to help pack on that extra density in a targeted muscle area.

MYTH 1: You need fancy protective equipment when you are lifting.

If you can’t dead lift 300-pounds without a belt or no straps then you aren’t strong enough to dead lift 300-pounds.
There is this mindset that to be a lifter you have to wear straps, expensive tennis shoes and use a weight belt. FALSE!
None of that stuff is necessary and in fact almost all of that hinders your strength gains. I am sure that there comes a time when maybe some of those things are necessary but when you consider that Louis Cyr quite possibly the strongest man to ever lived dead lifted over 500-pounds with no belt, straps or expensive shoes with only a finger then those things sort of seem pointless.
Once again I can’t stress technique enough which a lack off is primarily why people wear belts. Most people in a YMCA or college recreation centers are not a world powerlifting champion like current world strongest man Zydrunas Savickas.
I have yet to see in person someone dead lift 800-pounds at an everyday run of the mill gym. Until you are an elite power lifter there isn’t much of a need for a belt.
Read about muscle tension and irradiation written about in Pavel Tsatsouline’s “Power to the People” book and it becomes clear that bracing your muscles tight before a lift acts as a natural weight belt to protect your spine.
Next are straps another one of those things where unless your are an elite power lifter have no business using.
You’ll notice at most gyms these amateur bodybuilders will be shrugging with the 100-pound dumb bells but are using straps. These guys are weak, I’m sorry and are severely limiting their bodies development.
Don’t shrug or dead lift more then you can grip. If you can’t grip it then you need to go back to the drawing board and work on getting your hands stronger.
Stronger hands equals a stronger lifter the harder you can grip something the tenser your body becomes and allows you to lift more.
It’s irradiation again and even in exercises like the bench press a strong grip can make the difference in setting that new personal record.
Finally shoes.
A lot of lower back, knee and ankle problems come from modern shoes. Scientists are discovering that injuries shoes are designed to prevent actually cause them. Forget about lifting weights in Air Jordans your best bet is going barefoot.
If you can’t go barefoot then wear something flat like some Converse Chuck Taylors, Vibram Five Fingers or some of those water shoes you buy at the beach.
Why do this?
Well for lifters it is because you are lower to the ground and have less distance to move a weight off the floor from. Also, since your not as high up and your standing flat instead of a pronated position your less likely to roll your ankles and knees.
You get more muscle activation as well when your wearing a minimal amount of shoe your forcing those underused muscles on the bottoms of your feet to actually work.

Conclusion

Finally, I can’t stress technique enough I know there are going to be these first time lifters who read this that will think they can just pull weight of the ground without a weight belt. Technique is always the most important thing to learn in weight lifting and anyone considering doing it should research and train technique before attempting to lift heavy weights.
Be smart before you lift heavy and makes sure to talk to your doctor before starting any kind of exercise program.